This week, our guest blogger is author Maggie Blackbird…
When you’re setting is a special place, drafting the novel, I find, is easy. Seriously. It didn’t take me long to draft Her Competition (mind you editing is a whole other ball game LOL). The city is steeped in history, and since it’s a place where I’ve lived, travelled to for business trips and pleasure, it was natural for me to finally write a novel in the city on Canada’s prairies. I’d yet to feature a Métis character in my books, so the book gave me a chance to look into another of Canada’s Indigenous peoples. I find when I’m writing something I love, I can’t stop writing. So it’s always important for me to choose a setting that means something to me.
The same goes for the job. In Canada, we have APTN (the Aboriginal people’s network). This channel is dedicated to the three Indigenous groups: Métis, First Nations, and Inuit. Since I wanted to become a journalist as a young girl, of course I can’t get enough of APTN news, so I made up my own new station dedicated to Canada’s Indigenous people for the novel.
Blurb:
Two sexy work rivals each want the prestigious promotion, but neither expects to want each other.
Driven and determined, Celeste Fisher won’t let anything stop her from anchoring the nightly news. She’s sacrificed a personal life, a love life, and left her Ojibway community to make it in the city. And if that means stomping all over her too handsome and too competitive rival to nail the position, so be it.
Casual dating and one-night stands are all Reed Dumont can spare while building what he covets most—his career. He’s not about to lose out to Celeste, no matter if he can’t keep his eyes off her sexy legs and admiring her just as sexy brain, because sitting in the broadcasting chair is another step up the ladder to thumb his nose at his poor Métis upbringing.
A crisis in a First Nations community sends the adversaries out on the road to cover the story. Snowed in at the hotel, rivals become humans, unable to deny their true private desires. But upon returning to the city, the new lovers face the biggest hurdle that could cost them their budding relationship when one gets the promotion and the other is left holding… frustration. Now they must decide what is worth fighting for: love or career.
Available at: https://books2read.com/u/bokKg9
Excerpt:
Ramona meandered over, holding a squirming Thumper. She set him down. The rabbit hopped across the hardwood floor. “They were so good. Too good.”
Celeste clutched the end of the island. “When did you say the movie started?”
“For the third time—nine.” Ramona knitted her black brows and pulled up a seat. “Are you sure you’re not telling me everything?”
“What do you mean?” Celeste’s ears heated.
Ramona refilled their wine glasses. She tucked a strand of her fire-engine-red dye job cut into a sleek bob behind her ear. “It’s like you’re trying to get rid of me. I wasn’t born yesterday. I’ve got quite a few years on you. What’s going on? Did the jackass behave like a true donkey?”
Celeste snatched up the wine glass. “No. Reed was fine. Everything went fine. I need to finish my draft. That’s all. Fontaine wants it to go live on Monday.”
“With how meticulous your boss sounds, I’m betting your supervisor already approved your draft. That means once the meeting was done, you returned to your desk to begin working on your voice-over. And you wouldn’t have left the office if you didn’t at least have a rough draft finished. So tell me, what’s really going on?”
There wasn’t a chance Ramona would approve. Not a woman who’d never married and had concentrated on her career. Celeste gripped the island tighter. At one time she’d admired her dear friend’s ambition, but as of this moment, she wasn’t so sure if she wanted the same life now.
Ramona swirled the wine in the glass. “Level with me.”
Celeste peeked at the clock. “Could I get a rain check? I’m not kidding. I’ve got a lot of work.” Dammit, Reed would arrive any second.
Sighing, Ramona set her elbows on the island, holding the wine glass with both hands. “You slept with him, didn’t you?”
Author Bio: An Ojibway from Northwestern Ontario, Maggie resides in the country with her husband and their fur babies, two beautiful Alaskan Malamutes. When she’s not writing, she can be found pulling weeds in the flower beds, mowing the huge lawn, walking the Mals deep in the bush, teeing up a ball at the golf course, fishing in the boat for walleye, or sitting on the deck at her sister’s house, making more wonderful memories with the people she loves most.
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